LG patents K40s and K50s for Europe

LG is announcing a number of phones at IFA 2019, including some midrangers and low-end handsets. The Korean company has received patents for the K40s and K50s monikers by the EUIPO (European Union Intellectual Property Office), meaning it can now use them freely across the 28 countries, members of the EU. Patents by EUIPO Both the K40s and K50s are expected to be an update over the LG K40 and LG K50, announced six months ago at MWC 2019 in Barcelona. Both devices are with an HD+ screen, basic RAM+storage combinations (2/32 GB and 3/32 GB, respectively) and a dedicated Google...

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Redmi Note 8 Pro coming on August 29 with 64MP quad camera

Earlier this month Xiaomi sub-brand Redmi announced that it will launch its 64MP camera smartphone in Q4 this year. Now we know that it will be called the Redmi Note 8 Pro and will be unveiled on August 29. Redmi shared a poster on Chinese social network Weibo giving us a glimpse of the Note 8 Pro that has three cameras aligned vertically on its back, with the fourth one placed on the right. The image further reveals that the Note 8 Pro won't come with an in-display fingerprint reader as it's placed below the rear cameras. Redmi will also announce the Note 8 on August 29...

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Nokia 3 V is headed to Verizon on August 23, yours for just $168

HMD Global today announced the Nokia 3 V, its first ever device that will be offered by Verizon on post-paid plans. This builds upon how successful the Nokia 2 V has been on prepaid. The carrier will exclusively sell the handset in blue from August 23 in select stores and online. The Nokia 3 V will be yours for just $168 full retail, or 24 monthly installments of $7. The device runs Android 9 Pie and HMD Global guarantees it will receive 18 months of security patches and two OS upgrades. So for an investment of $168 you won't just be getting Android Q, but also Android R next year. That's...

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Xiaomi Mi 9T Pro gets official in Europe as rebranded Redmi K20 Pro, starts at €399

As expected, today Xiaomi made the Mi 9T Pro official for European markets. The phone is, unsurprisingly based on all the rumors, just a rebadged version of the Redmi K20 Pro that's already been out in other parts of the world. The Mi 9T Pro will be available from its own official online store in the European countries where Xiaomi has a presence, and you'll also find it at Amazon. The handset starts at €399 for the version with 6GB of RAM and 64GB of storage. If you want 128GB of storage, you'll need to shell out €449. Only the red and black models seem to be initially on...

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EMUI 9.1 is now on its way to 8 more Huawei and Honor phones

Last month Huawei and Honor sent out the update to EMUI 9.1 to 10 smartphones, and today a new batch is ready. This time around, we're talking about 8 devices in total between the two brands, including some launched as far back as 2016 - and yet they're still receiving the latest software update. Here's the full list: Huawei Mate 9, Mate 9 Pro, Mate 9 Porsche Design, P10, P10 Plus, nova 2s, Honor V9, and Honor 9. The EMUI 9.1 update has already been going out to some of these in some territories, but now we have an official announcement touting the rollout. Keep in mind though that...

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Motorola's Razr foldable phone to land in Europe in December with a €1,500 price tag

Motorola has long been rumored to revive the Razr line with its first foldable smartphone, and new details have come in today about this device. As anticipated, it will be a mid-ranger, and it should apparently get a release in Europe in December 2019 or January 2020. To get one, you will need to part with no less than €1,500. Compared to Samsung's Galaxy Fold and Huawei's Mate X that is much cheaper indeed, but the new Razr will still be around 50% more expensive than its competitors' top of the line handsets with non-folding screens. Thus, it may turn out to be a tough sell. The...

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OnePlus TV launching in September, coming to India first

OnePlus has announced that it will be launching its OnePlus TV next month in September. The company also announced that the TV will first be announced in India. The announcement was made by founder and CEO Pete Lau on the company's forum. Lau largely talked about the challenges involved in making a television as well as what we can expect from it once it releases. Lau explained that the reason the OnePlus TV will be releasing first in India is because the company has great relations with the content providers in the country. For OnePlus and for televisions in general, content is...

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Samsung will release Marvel-themed smart covers for the Galaxy Note10 and Note10+

You can trust Marvel's superheroes to protect the Earth as well as your phone - Samsung will release Marvel-themed smart covers for the Galaxy Note10. The "smart" feature here is pretty basic, the covers have an NFC chip that lets your phone automatically switch to a matching theme. The four cases we've seen so far feature Iron Man, Spider-Man, Captain America and Deadpool. Here's what they look like on the Galaxy Note10+: Marvel cases on the Galaxy Note10+: Iron Man • Spider-Man • Captain America • Deadpool And here's a sample of the wallpapers that will be loaded up...

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Apple's TV+ coming in November for $9.99/month

Apple unveiled its TV+ service with exclusive shows, movies and series in March and left it at 'Coming this Fall' with no price tag. Now, according to sources within Apple, TV+ is scheduled for a November debut, costing $9.99 per month. Apple is expected to also offer a free trial period - likely one month - bringing TV+ in line with Apple Music. Apple will enter a busy market with its streaming service. Netflix and Amazon Prime Video have established a strong position while Disney is about to launch its own service. Netflix and Amazon charge slightly less at $8.99 while Disney+ will...

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Xiaomi reports 60 million shipped phones in H1 2019

Xiaomi just released its financial report for the first half of 2019 and the numbers are good. Revenues stood at CNY 95.71 billion ($13.56 billion), a 20% improvement compared to the first half of last year. Adjusted net profits came out to CNY 5.72 billion ($810.36 million) which is a 49.8% year on year increase. Looking into phone shipments, Xiaomi managed to move 60 million units in the period despite stagnating global market. Outside of the smartphone business, Xiaomi's TV line also proved to be a big success as the company ranked first in China with 5.4 million units for the...

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Leaked Xiaomi Redmi Note 8 ad shows off NFC

Xiaomi is busy shooting promo videos for the Redmi Note 8 and that carries a risk of leaks. We saw the Redmi Note 8 Pro starring in an ad yesterday, now a clip has surfaced on TikTok showing the Redmi Note 8 using its NFC. Yes, NFC. It's not the most exciting feature, but Xiaomi phones tend to omit it, it's something reserved for the flagship Mi series. NFC has been gaining adoption in China as AliPay and Apple Pay adopt it (QR codes are still prevalent, though). It's not clear if this is the "Pro" model or not or quite what will be the differences between the two. The Pro is...

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Samsung Galaxy A50 gets improved battery charging with latest update

Samsung is pushing out a new firmware for its Galaxy A50 which brings an improved battery charging algorithm paired with refined fingerprint reader performance and the usual stability tweaks. The new firmware bearing the A505FDDU2ASH3 name weighs in at 320MB and also brings the August security patch. In a surprising twist, Samsung also appears to be pre-installing Snapchat as part of this update. Recently, the Galaxy A70 also got some third-party apps with an update to the surprise of users. It was reported that the apps could be uninstalled but we'll have to wait and see if the option...

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Redmi Note 7 series smashes another milestone, reaches over 20 million sales

Redmi announced its separation from Xiaomi as a standalone brand with the arrival of the Redmi Note 7 at the beginning of the year, and by the looks of the sales numbers, the lineup was a massive success. The company announced on its Weibo page that it reached 20 million sold phones across the world in just seven months. The poster simply says "Thank you" to all 20 million users of a Redmi Note 7 smartphone, saying that it is now time to move to the Redmi Note 8. Apparently, Redmi is already on the final straight in the preparation of the new smartphone, since the Weibo account is...

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Samsung Galaxy Note10 pre-orders in South Korea are twice as high as Note9's

The Samsung Galaxy Note10 is a hit in South Korea - the locals have pre-ordered twice as many units as they did Galaxy Note9s last year. The new flagship went up on pre-order on August 9, so it has been 11 days (Samsung will start shipping units this Friday). And in that period a total of 1.3 million units of Note 10 and Note10+ have been pre-ordered. The most popular model proved to be the Galaxy Note10+ 5G with 256GB storage and the Aura Glow paint job. Note that Samsung is only offering the 5G versions of both Note10s in South Korea. Korean carriers have been offering subsidies...

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vivo IQOO Pro 5G tops AnTuTu charts ahead of launch

vivo's IQOO lineup will get its newest member with the unveiling of the IQOO Pro 5G on August 22. Now the device bearing the V1916A model number passed through AnTuTu and delivered quite the performance, pushing out 497,179 points - a new record on the benchmark. Previously, we saw the unreleased Meizu 16s Pro post 464,411 points which was a record in itself. According to the AnTuTu Weibo page, the performance is achieved in large thanks to the F2FS file system combined with TurboWrite SDD technology. The listing also reaffirms the phone will ship with the Snapdragon 855+ chipset...

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Realme confirms its 64 MP flagship is going to be called XT

The Realme 5 and Realme 5 Pro were introduced today, and at the end of the announcement the company also had a little teaser for us - it confirmed its the 64MP phone will be called Realme XT. The event ended with Green Day's song "Wake Me Up When September Ends", which was likely another hint - the device will be announced in early October. The phone is dubbed "64 MP Quad Camera Xpert" and will have Samsung's new ISOCELL Bright GW1 sensor. Since we already had some hands-on experience with a pre-production unit, we know the phone will also have a wide-angle lens, macro camera and a...

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Oppo Reno2 get certified by TENAA and 3C, images and specs arrive

Oppo is gearing to introduce the second generation in its Reno line soon and two devices bearing the PCKM00 and PCKT00 model numbers just passed through Chinese certification agencies TENAA and 3C. Oppo Reno2 in Pink Going through the TENAA listing we see both devices are identical apart from the added 256GB storage option for the PCKM00 model. The Reno2 will come with a 6.5-inch AMOLED FHD+ screen and a 16 MP selfie camera housed in the quirky shark fin pop-up mechanism. Around the back, it will have a quad-camera setup with a 48MP F/1.7 main shooter, 13MP telephoto, 8MP...

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Realme 5 and 5 Pro hands-on review

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Realme 5 and Realme 5 Pro bring four cameras, new chipsets

Say hello to the Realme 5 and Realme 5 Pro - the latest pair of aggressively priced phones from the young company. They bring four cameras, new and more powerful chipsets and ample batteries. Realme 5 The more affordable Realme 5 packs a 6.5" display of HD+ resolution (720 x 1600 pixels), which translates to a 20:9 tall ratio. The device is powered by a Snapdragon 665 - it is historically the second phone with the 11 nm chipset, but is first in India, since the Xiaomi Mi A3 is yet to hit the market. Memory-wise, there are three combinations - 3/32GB, 4/64GB,...

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vivo NEX 3 live image shows waterfall screen

After teasing the waterfall screen and design sketch of the upcoming vivo NEX 3, the brand's Product Manager Li Xiang continued his teaser campaign by showing out the phone in the flesh on Chinese social platform Weibo. The slope is much more pronounced than offerings from other manufacturers like Samsung and OnePlus. The same photo with adjusted lighting gives us an even better look at the phone and reveals that the side bezels are relatively thick. The black bars could just be a software trick or the device is in a protective shell to prevent the full design from being...

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